Anti-Corruption Crusade – What Does It Mean?

Perhaps the biggest change in India since I have been born has been what we have seen in the last 4 days.

It’s not the change that amazes me… It’s the ferocity with which it has happened. For years and decades, cynics like me have been calling for an almost dictatorship like rule in India to cause major changes. This change seems exactly like that.

This is perhaps the most secular change that we have ever seen in this country. There is no exception for the rich or the poor, for Hindu or Muslim, for Brahmin or Dalit. There seems to be a clear focus in the government to not give a back door exit to people. You got WRONG money, you gotta pay!

Government has not banned Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes. It has banned unexplainable stashed money. That’s what has really happened.

And it’s discomforting everyone for sure. People have been supportive, they have been more supportive than they were when Kargil war broke out, YES, that’s the magnitude of frustration that everyone had with the black money and corruption.

The question everyone is asking is whether it could have been planned better. It could have been and it should have been. Here are some of the things that could and should have been done.

A slower roll-out of the new currency. It could have been rolled out in the garb of replacement currency and could have had similar restrictions in exchange as it does right now.

Stronger integration with the banks in terms of the availability of the new currency.

Keep the currency working for sometime by telling people to accept it with the right receipts and right mechanism. Put a cap on the size of the transaction and tell everyone that they are accepting it at their risk. If they are able to justify this money, they can encash it for the new currency.

While I say that, let me also acknowledge the government for having taken tons of steps to make things happen. Whether it was asking people with higher income for disclosing all their assets or integrating everything from AADHAAR / PAN or providing people a window for disclosing their black money, they kind of did it all.

And let me assure you, everything else you hear around it is 100% true.

Yes, this decision is hugely politically motivated.

Yes, some people may have known it and may have used it to their advantage.

Yes, this gave BJP the mojo they were missing in the last 2 years and what they will need for Punjab & UP elections.

Yes, this takes away the anti-corruption champion tag from Kejriwal and gives it to Modi.

Nevertheless, it looks like the government is inspired enough to take this to the hilt. I have always been very critical of socialistic policies of the government. But I have always asterisked them with pseudo-socialist. If there was ever a TRUE socialist movement or policy created in independent India, it’s gotta be this. And I love it! There is nothing pseudo about it.

Couple more of these and we will truly be the country that we deserve to be. At this point, we need to act together, we need to act strong and we need to support.

I, for one, am willing to stop giving grief to this government and give them a chance. If they fail, I will come back as their biggest critic and opposition.